ANNIVERSARY DISCOURSE. 413 



activity of the French in the fame purfuits may not be 

 fuperior to ours; and that the refearchesof M . Sonnerat, 

 whom the court of Verfailles employed for feven years 

 in thefe climates, merely to collecl fuch materials as we 

 are feeking, may kindle, inftead of abating, our own 

 curiofity and zeal. If you affent, as I flatter myfelf 

 you do, to thefe opinions, you will alfo concur in pro- 

 moting the objeft of them; and a few ideas having 

 prefented themfelves to my mind, I prefume to lay 

 them before you, with an entire fubmiffion to your 

 judgment. 



No contributions, except thofe of the literary kind, 

 will be requifite for the fupport of the Society : but if 

 each of us were occafionally to contribute a fuccin6l 

 defcription of fuch manufcripts as he had perufed, or 

 infpefted, with their dates, and the names of their 

 owners, and to propofe for folution, fuch quejlions as 

 had occurred to him concerning Afiatick Art, Science, 

 and Hiftory, natural or civil, we mould poffefs with- 

 out labour, and almoft by imperceptible degrees, a 

 fuller catalogue of Oriental Books than has hitherto 

 been exhibited ; and our correfpondents mould be ap- 

 prifed of thofe points to which we chiefly direct our 

 investigations. Much may, I am confident, be ex- 

 pected from the communications of learned natives, 

 whether lawyers, phyficians, or private fcholars, who 

 would eagerly, on the firft invitation, fend us their 

 Mekdmdt and Rifdlahs on a variety of fubjecls; fome 

 for the fake of advancing general knowledge; but molt 

 of them from a defire, neither uncommon nor unrea- 

 fonable, of attracting notice, and recommending them- 

 felves to favour. With a view to avail ourfel ves of this 

 difpofition, and to bring their latent fcience under our 

 infpeclion, it might be advifable to print and- circulate 

 a fhort memorial, in Perfian and Hindi, fetting forth, 

 in a ftyle accommodated to their own habits and pre- 



judicesj 



